To Save the Devil
by Deaths.RoseXo
Summary: Nyla, a young winged creature, goes for a flight one day. She stumbles across a strange graveyard. After some wandering around, she finds a chamber with a hole in the ground. In the hole, something is stuck. She decides to help the creature out...


Disclaimer: The characters of Hellboy (Karl Kroenen) do not belong to me, but Nyla is my character.

Kroenen didn't know how long he stayed in that pit, impaled by his own death-trap's spikes. Days? Weeks? He could not tell. The ticking of his eternal clockwork and the perpetual pouring of sand from him open wounds were the only markers of time. Insanity seemed to infect his mind, or at least claimed more of him than it had already. Left only to his thoughts, he ran over clockwork mechanics, human anatomy, and ways he could further improve his body with his surgeries. Thoughts seemed to run through his mind like a song on loop to the point were he wished he could no longer possess even the simplest of thoughts. The pain was, at first, delightful. He relished the searing of muscle and flesh, but he now no longer felt the same thrill, same high, from the sensation. Now he only wished to get free, but that would prove to be an impossiblity, at least left to himself that is. Kroenen hated to admit defeat, so rarely had he ever had to do so, but now he had no choice. The big red demon had truly won this battle.

Nyla, a winged creature with the gift of telepathy, was still just a youngen, barely 17. She was a kind-hearted creature that did her best to obey the rules of her parents and those found in religious books. Never did she shy away from aiding those in need.

Nyla:  
>Out one day, bored with studying and wishing to stretch my stiff wings, I decided to go for a flight. I was one of the best flyers in my village, and I participated in a sport very similar to what humans refer to as "Track". I lived in Munch, Germany at the time this all occured. Once outside my house, I spread my big, tan wings and took flight atop the light, cool breeze. It was beautiful out and I just wanted to fly and fly and fly. I flew pretty far, all the way to Russia. When I grew tired and needed a rest, I landed in a cemetary, covered in rotted and decaying shrubbery. It was made even creepier with the towering statues and cracked head stones and unwelcoming mosoleums, yet something seemed to call to me, lead me among the maze of graves. I followed the instinctive pull to one large mosoleum, whose door was cracked open slightly. Without thinking, I heaved the door open futher and entered the tomb. Inside was dark, damp, and dreary. It stunk of mold and dust, and in the faint light, cobwebs glittered. A large, gloomy corridor lead into blackness devoid of earthly sun.<br>I don't know how long or how far a stumpled among the darkness, tripping over uneven ground and debris, but I came to a second, short hallway lined with spikes that lead to a tiny chamber; an oil lamp lit and sitting on a desk centered in the room. I shuffled down the narrow hall, careful not to get pricked by one of the rusted metal spikes. Someone, or something, must have been there not too long ago for the lamp to still hold a steady flame. I should have just turned and ran, pretended that I never found this secret lair, but I couldn't help but sense there was someone near by, even though I heard no thoughts.  
>Inside the tiny room, I glanced around. Huge, rusty gears churned slowly in the walls, broken glass laid shattered along the dusty floor boards, and small gears lay in heaps here and there. On the rotting desk was an array of strange gasmasks along with sketches, diagrams, of the most disturbing things I have ever seen. Intricate drawings of human flesh and muscle sautered to metal and wires. Detailed instuctions of how to recreate human limbs and attach them to mechanical devices. Painful, unGodly procedures to recreate and reanimate dead flesh and ligiments. I put the pages down before noticing the big, round whole in the floor. I looked down into the 10 foot-deep pit. There was a huge gear resting on the bottom of it, but not perfectly flat, like someone had thrown it down there. But why would someone do that?<p>

Kroenen:  
>In the endless silence, I heard footsteps. Conviced I was halucinating due to sensory deprivation, I didn't think much of it at first, but I still listened; hoping against hope that someone had come, someone that could help me. But I also hoped it wasn't the red demon who landed me in this inconvienient spot. The footsteps got louder as the person- or thing- became closer. It was in the room with me. I heard shuffling of papers and the occasional gasp as it looked over my work and sketches. This made me angry- I hated when people examined my things, though I could not blame them; it was quite interesting.<p>

Nyla kneeled on the ground, gazing over the edge into the strange pit. She swore she could hear something, almost like a raspy, shallow breathing.

Nyla:  
>I couldn't believe that someone could be in the bottom of that pit, but I still couldn't shake off the feeling that something was terribly wrong in that dank, dark place. Though I could not hear the creature's thoughts, I still could not fight the urge to call out.<br>"Hello?"  
>The strange breathing sound stopped abruptly. My heart thundered in my chest as the fine hairs on the back of my neck stood on end.<br>"Hello?" I called again, voice more shakey.  
>"Help!" Came a cry in German. The fact that I recieved an answer was terrifying. On the edge of my mind I couldn't shake the fact that I heard no thoughts from the creature. What was down there? And more importantly, how did it get down there, under that huge metal cog?<br>"Hold on!"

Kroenen:  
>The creature above me had a soft, feminine voice. It obviously was not my concourer. After sometime and much shuffling about, I could hear the protest and grinding of gears, working hard against something. Miraculously, the giant gear that had me pinned for so long began to lift off of me. Without the enormous pressure on my chest, I was allowed to expand my lungs beneath shattered rips. I looks down atmy body. Large steel spikes pertruded from my center, just beneath my sternum, and more slender spikes empaled my left leg and arm. This would require a lot of repairs.<br>I looked up to the surface of the pit when a gentle-faced creature with fair skin and oxyn hair peered over the edge of the hole. How interesting of a being, like an angel, wings and all. Though, when she took in the gruesome sight of my mangled body covered in sand, what was at one time crimson blood, she shrieked. She disappeared from my sight, and I figured she had ran away in terror.  
>There were no receeding footsteps, at least none that I heard, but still I presumed myself to be alone. I began to thrash my trapped limbs about, starting first with my arm. I could feel the bicep muscles shred reluctantly, protesting the damagethey needed to sustain in order to free myself. I got my arm free and started to work on ripping my leg free of its spike when the angelic creature returned.<br>"STOP!" She screamed. I looked up to see her face devoid of color.

Nyla:  
>"Just stop it! Let me come down and help you!" I yelled, trying to push away the image of him tearing his limbs apart as though they were not part of his body and merrly just an old scrap of cloth. I clambered down into the strange pit as carefully as I could manage. Avoiding the spikes, I manuvered my way towards him.<br>"Oh, my God! How did you get down here like this? What on Earth happened?" I asked the odd man, truly not wishing to know.  
>"Long story. Just help me get this spike out of my chest." I didn't even think about how he could still be alive, much less have the strength to give me demands. I was still in a state of shock due to finding something like this.<br>"How do I-" I cut off abruptly, eyes bugging out when he shredded his leg out of the spike with a swift jerk.  
>"Lift me off the final spike." He ordered. I did so.<br>The man tried to stand, but wobbled. I threw out my hand to catch him but he hit me away with his good arm.  
>"Let me help you."<br>"Get me out of this pit."

Kroenen:  
>The winged creature helped me out of the pit. Up close I could see her eyes were bright gold, like those of an eagle. She wrapped her arms around my torn, wasted body and flapped her wings. Once out of the hole, I picked up one of my masks and dusted it off, replacing the damaged one I had on. The creature did not make a sound once I removed the dented mask. Perhaps someone can only be surprised so much in a day.<br>I looked around to see how she had managed to lift the huge cog. There was a rope tied around the large gear which she had looped around the gears in the walls. She had used them as a pulley system. Crafty.  
>"How did you find this place?" I demanded. She blinked, clearly still in shock over what she had discovered.<br>"I...I don't know." She sounded as though her brain was in a fog.  
>"I suppose it does matter much anyway. Help me get out of here." I could have very well have managed my way out, but in my condition it would have proven to be quite a challenge.<p>

Nyla:  
>The man, or creature, I couldn't be sure as to what this thing could have truly been was horrifying yet intriging at the same time. When he removed his destroyed mask, the sight that met my eyes was scarring. He had no eyelids over his cobolt eyes and no lips to cover his cadavorous teeth. He stood tall and proud, or at least as much so as someone in his pardicument could manage. Without hesitation, he fired demands at me, ordered me around. I couldn't really fault him, for if I was in as much pain as he must have been- and only God knows how lond he was stuck that way- I would have been a crab-apple myself.<br>He picked up two tonfa swords that were stabbed into the ground beside the gaping hole in the ground- funny, I hadn't noticed them before. I wrapped my arm around his abdomin, supporting him, as we navigated our way through the muddy darkness. He clearly knew his was around because he told me when and were to turn and when to pick up my feet so I wouldn't trip. The further away we wandered from the tiny chamber, the ticking sound of gears never faded , after what felt like hours of being lost in pitch blankness, there was the faint shimmer of light ahead.  
>Once outside, he pulled himself away from me. Still I could hear the distint tick-tock of a clock.<br>"Do you hear that?" I asked.

Kroenen smirked liplessly behind his mask. He knew exactly what she was talking about, his clockwork heart.  
>"Hear what?" He feigned innocence.<br>"That...ticking sound. Do you have a watch or something on you?"  
>"You could say that." Kroenen enjoyed toying with the beautiful creature. She looked at him in confusion, she couldn't understand his crypic words. At this, the clockwork assassin laughed, a cruel, forced sound. "I must repay you for your assisstance."<br>"Oh, no, that's not nessacary." Nyla blushed, looking down.  
>"Tell me, what is your name?"<br>"Nyla."  
>"Well, Nyla, I wish I could be more greatful, but..." Kroenen trailed off. With his good arm, he reached for his tonfa sword, twirling it menecingly. Before the poor, winged creature could react, Kroenen swung his tonfa, slicing her slender neck with the presicion of a surgeon. The creature's body fell limp to the cold, snow covered ground, quickly draining its blood. The snow around Nyla's body became stained crimson.<br>Kroenen watched as his savior's life ebbed away with each pulse of her heart. The gorgeous, winged creature was no more. Kroenen smiled cruelly to himself, pleased with his work well done. He could not leave any witnesses, much less one that had to resue him- he would not suffer the embaressment of having to admit that a young teenaged creature had to come to his aid. He was Karl Rupret Kroenen, and he could not let the distraction keep his mind from the task he had at hand. As soon as he had repaired himself, he set work to his mission, to awaken the Seven gods of Chaos to unlease them upon the Earth, bringing about the end of the world.

Poor Nyla only wished to help a creature in need, but sometime the things we do are only to save the Devil.


End file.
